A recent story by Michael Freedman-Schnapp on the Greater
Greater Washington blog (here) points out some of the social, housing, and transportation
issues that the classic “new town” of Reston, Virginia is dealing with.
As you probably know, Reston has been an urban planning icon
since it was founded in 1964. It
is (as the Reston website (here) says) “the largest planned community in
Virginia and one of the most renowned planned communities in the nation” with
its development based on the values of “open space, recreational facilities,
social heterogeneity and aesthetic beauty.”
Freedman-Schnapp points out the weakness of Reston’s
transportation network: The town’s master plan and vision are “completely
silent on a vision of how a well-designed transportation system can further the
preservation of the environment — a notable blind spot of an otherwise
eco-friendly ethic. In its place, the county has provided a transportation
system that makes it very difficult, if not outright dangerous, to be a
pedestrian in Reston.” His
recommendations focus on better pedestrian links around the new Reston Metro
stations.
And about those stations: the biggest transportation news in
Reston is that the Metro has come to town! The Silver Line reached its current, temporary terminus at
Wiehle—Reston East in 2014. Two
new Reston stations – Reston Town Center and Herndon – are scheduled to open in
2020. The Fairfax County Office of
Community Revitalization has published a very thoughtful and comprehensive
paper, “Guidelines for Development: Reston Transit Station Areas” (available
here), which sets out a plan for getting the best land use/transportation
connection out of these stations.
Wiehle—Reston East and Herndon are somewhat limited by their suburban
habitats. Reston Town Center is
the big opportunity.
Unfortunately, the station is not actually in the town center. In
an ideal world, the station would be underground, with entrances on Market
Street, perhaps at the Reston Town Square Park, stimulating the kind of urban
development found in Arlington.
But in the real world, the station is half a mile a way on an aerial
platform in the median of the Dulles Toll Road. This is what you get when you put transit in these outer
suburban settings. Nevertheless,
the county planners (in coordination with local officials) have done a good job
in planning new connective links and transit oriented development that will
“extend and complement” the Town Center.
1.
Reston Town Center is a real downtown, with a
lot going on and a lot of potential.
It is definitely “transit ready development!”
2.
The town is (as Freedman-Schnapp notes) very
auto-centric. You may be able to
walk to your local village center for a few goods and services, but if you
don’t have a car you’re largely stuck.
3.
The Lake Anne village center is definitely cool
(I agree with Freedman-Schnapp here).
My own photo of this location is below.
Neither the Freedman-Schnapp piece nor the county planning
study touch on how to get people from the neighborhoods to the Metro stations
or the Town Center. To make Reston
really sustainable, it seems to me one would want to have some sort of transit
shuttle service connecting the “village centers” to the Metro stations, the
Town Center, and possibly to one another.
Local transit can be expensive, but this one might provide a good
application for automated transit (OLLI anyone?).
